Road

to K3

A conversation starter on why and how we should build a 1 million member interstellar volunteer community

K4: Cosmic

K3: Galactic

K2: Solar

K1: Planetary

African
Possible development path of human civilization inspired by Kardashev scale of technological advancement of extraterrestrial civilizations.

Intent
Target audience: 100 YSS and the global interstellar community. Goal: We would like to find a way to amplify and fund the collective efforts of the global interstellar community. This is an open draft. Everything in this presentation is up for discussion. In fact, weve put this presentation together specifically to enable a discussion.

Inside
Predicament Solution Next steps

Predicament

Starflight capability by 2112.

We all want to make it so.

There are (at least) two ways to think about this goal:

2112
Technological capability Road to K3

We can think in narrow terms and focus our efforts on a single goal: to see a star-bound ship launched at the start of the 22nd century.

We can think in broad terms and focus our efforts on building out a cultural infrastructure for K3 civilization, where technological capability is but one of the prerequisites.

One approach is easy but dangerous.

The other is safe but hard. Extremely hard.

Easy but dangerous

Narrow, single-minded focus produces results. We can be almost certain we will be able to tick the box on technological capability. Voyager 1 does not have enough fuel to get to another star. But we could probably send our first star-bound craft using beamed sails in the next 5-10 years. It may take a few thousand years to get to Alpha Centauri but it will be possible. Unfortunately, technological capability comes with no guarantee that it will be put to good use. Case in point: What have we done with our moon-landing capability over the last half a century? Narrow focus may be easy but it is also very dangerous. All of us reading these words right now may work very hard to get to star flight capability by 2112 but die with that nagging doubtwill they or will they not take it further?

Technological capability

Hard but safe

Broad, multi-track focus is hard. Especially, when it needs to be sustained across people with completely different interests (e.g., breakthrough propulsion vs. global policy agenda) and across generations. Its messy because humans are messy. It comes with a high collective action and coordination tax. Without effective organization, it may slow us down. Way down. But if we dont just create technological capability but embed the interstellar dream deep in our collective psyche, in our civilizational goalsthen we have a shot at something much more valuable. We could make interstellar civilization inevitable. All of us reading these words right now would work very hard to lay down a solid foundation for K3 civilization and die with some degree of confidenceit may take time, but human civilization will expand beyond our solar system.

Road to K3

Work load
Illustrative

Technological capability
Find destination. Solve propulsion problem. Design starship. Design life-support systems in space and for destination planet. Engage the public. Get funding. Build starship. Recruit astronauts. Launch.

Road to K3

All that, plus: Create a steady stream of identityexpanding, interstellar-dream-advancing content (books, movies, TV series, games, op-eds). Put interstellar on global public policy and entrepreneurial agenda. Catalyze industrialization of space, starting with our solar system. Catalyze solutions to a host of terrestrial problems, etc. etc. etc.

So its really more like this:

So the choice is between easy but dangerous and safe but extremely hard.

We should play it safe.

After all, its the future of our civilization we are talking about.

So how do we make interstellar civilization inevitable?

Who will do all this work?

Solution

Government. Business. Academia. Billionaire philanthropists.

All of them will need to play a role.

But having any of them in the drivers seat will increase the risk of the mission.

After all, governments can get side-tracked on other priorities (and apparently even get shut down). Businesses can confuse the mission (serving a civilizational need) with the means (generating profit). Billionaire philanthropists can change their minds.

The drivers seat needs to be filled with a force that wont change course in the face of adversity.

We need volunteers united by a common dream. Volunteers who see the success of the mission as their primary goal.

We need lots of them.

1 million.

Are we smoking something?

Well, lets do a macro-sanity check.

Availability
With the advent of online tools that allow new forms of collaboration, as a civilization we are now learning how to use more constructively the free time afforded to us since the 1940s for creative acts rather than consumptive ones. The cognitive surplusthe buildup of free time among the worlds educated populationis now in the order of magnitude of a trillion hours a year. We are in the middle of Great Spare-Time Revolution. There is a massive reservoir of volunteer time that we can tap.

Source: Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age, Clay Shirky 2010

Will
Five decades of behavioural research shows that most enduring motivations are not external but internalthe joy of doing something for its own sake. We do things because theyre interesting, because theyre engaging, because theyre the right things to do, because they contribute to the world. For people looking to contribute to the world, to be part of something bigger, we can create an unprecedented opportunity contribute to the most ambitious mission in the history of human civilization.

Source: Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Daniel Pink (2010)

Precedents
Wikipedia: Almost 20 million people are registered as contributors with Wikipedia (even though only a minority of them are regular contributors.) All the articles, edits, and arguments about articles and edits represent around 100 million hours of human labor. Americans watch about 200 billion hours of TV every year. Linux: More than 100,000 people have contributed to development of open-source software.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedians

So lets assume there is availability, will and precedents we can learn from.

What would this 1 million Starfleet look like?

DESIGN PRINCIPLES
Opportunity to contribute Design around opportunity to contribute. Membership benefits, privileged access, etc. etc. are all secondary. Elaborate game Structure Starfleet into discrete units with clear mandateseverybody joins a specific unit. Break down each mandate into discrete missions with different volunteering opportunities earning members star points, leading to a higher rank. Digital & physical Maximize use of digital collaboration platforms but create ample opportunities for physical meetups as well.

STRUCTURE
COMMAND

SCIENCE

ENGINEERING

HEALTH BAY

Mandate: Overall vision, direction, coordination & funding.

Mandate: Advancing all relevant basic research.

Mandate: Propulsion, starship and habitat design.

Mandate: Human and lifesupport system (re)design.

CULTURE

SPACE ECONOMY

EDUCATION

POLICY

Mandate: Constant stream of relevant content.

Mandate: Industrialization of solar system.

Mandate: Pipeline of interstellar ensigns.

Mandate: Putting interstellar aspiration on global policy agenda.

ENSIGN ACTIVITY REPORT

Ms. Edward Lu
Starfleet #00079

General
miles

Paid membership fee Recruited 5 new ensigns

1,000 5,000

Culture
miles

Wrote a blog on sailcraft Gave a TEDx talk on black sky thinking Created business plan for Interstellar Art Academy TOTAL STARFLEET MILES EARNED SO FAR Starfleet miles remaining to reach Lieutenant rank

500 1,000 2,500 10,000 90,000

FUNDING OPEX
Membership fees
Flat membership fee of $5-10 per month would be more compatible with the volunteer ethos than multi-tiered schemes that promise higher benefits in exchange for higher contribution.

Annual sponsorships

Create sponsorship opportunities for no more than 2-3 entities each year (creates scarcity). Offer temporary brand association and opportunities for story-telling

Content

We should seriously consider creating our own franchise based around the interstellar quest, a version of future history thats 50-100 years ahead of reality.

FUNDING PROJECTS

Crowd-funding is now a viable way to fund specific space-related projects. However, successful campaigns dont just happen. They are heavily produced. For crowdfunding to become a serious source of funding, we need to develop inhouse skills.

FOUNDING FEDERATION

The volunteer organization could be launched and run by a Federation of interstellar organizations (100 YSS, Icarus Interstellar, Tau Zero, etc.). They can nominate the admirals running different units. Volunteer contributions carried out for any Federation organization would earn ensigns star miles and count towards rank. Opex cost can be distributed to different organizations based on strategic priorities decided by Command.

RECRUITING ENSIGNS

1,000
How: Tap existing combined networks of interstellar organizations

10,000
How: Tap broader space and science fiction community

100,000
How: Use our science fiction content franchise to create the pull in the general public

1 million
How: Use our science fiction content franchise to create the pull in the general public

2014

2016

2019

2023

Building 1 million member volunteer organization is not obvious but it is possible.

Starfleet
Stars: the next frontier. These are the adventures of Starfleet. Its hundred-year mission: to make the transition of human civilization to K3 inevitable, to catalyze the necessary scientific, technological and cultural breakthroughsso that one glorious day at the start of the 22nd century we can boldly go where no human has gone before.

Next Steps

Before we get carried away, lets think about this together first. We look forward to discuss these and other ideas to advance the interstellar mission!

About Us

What if we cared about the long-range future of human civilization as much as we care about our own? What if these two concerns became one? For Tyler, these are not rhetorical questions. He rolls up his sleeves and builds organizations and communities that pursue long-range visions: he kick-started Singularity Summits and MIRI (Machine Intelligence Research Institute), produced New Organ prizes for the Methuselah Foundation. Tyler believes that embedding our interstellar aspiration in an ambitious volunteer organization has the potential to become a powerful transformational moment for our culturedramatically expanding our collective time horizon.

Advancing long-term thinking

Tyler Emerson

Will human civilization have an unbounded future beyond Earth? Erika does not like wasting time on speculations. Instead, she spends her life doing everything she can to make it so. She has co-authored a multi-media book The Human Project where she put forward a long-ranging agenda for the human species. Through her advisory work and public speaking, she instigates hyper-visionary venturesmultigenerational ventures designed to advance human civilization. Shes helped construct several 100 year business plans and serves on advisory boards of several tech startups. In Erikas mind, the interstellar vision is a powerful organizing goal, a fantastic springboard for hyper-visionary ventures across every domain of human civilization.

Instigating hyper-visionary ventures

Erika Ilves